


Of bomb scares and ice creams

by Sapphy, SapphyWatchesYouSleep (Sapphy)



Series: Uncomfortable Conversations [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M, Multi, Not technically incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-29
Updated: 2011-10-29
Packaged: 2017-10-25 01:34:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/270263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphy/pseuds/Sapphy, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphy/pseuds/SapphyWatchesYouSleep
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John had just about accepted his extraordinary relationship with two Holmes', but that doesn't mean he's quite prepared to explain it to Anderson</p>
            </blockquote>





	Of bomb scares and ice creams

**Author's Note:**

> I can only apologise for this. Sorry.

People are funny things, John Watson reflects, and nowhere is this more obvious than in the realm of sex. People’s kinks and fetishes are so revealing.

Mycroft Holmes for example has a food fetish. John discovered this the first time they attempted to go on a proper date and he’d bought an ice cream from a little stand on the edge of Hyde park. He’d taken all of two licks before Mycroft had dragged him back to his omnipresent black sedan and done unspeakable things to him. It was from this educational experience that John had learnt about Mycroft’s obsessive dieting and his hatred of being out of control of his own body.

Mycroft also likes to have sex in places where there is just a chance that they’ll be seen. Not that John has any problem with that, but it wasn’t until the day Sherlock walked in on them and Mycroft had shoved him away and covered himself that he realised he didn’t actually want to be caught. That was how he learnt of Mycroft’s obsessive, even fetishistic, love of keeping secrets.

Sherlock on the other hand likes to watch. This is something John realised about him almost straight away, but it wasn’t until much later that he realised that this love extended to the bedroom as well. Of course his lack of perception was partly due to Sherlock being largely asexual. He didn’t like to be touched, he didn’t want sex, but that didn’t mean, John discovered on the day he walked in on him, Mycroft and a jar of nutella, that he didn’t have fetishes.

The other thing Sherlock loved, more, John thought, that anything else, including himself, was danger. That he’d discovered the first time Sherlock had really pushed him to his limit. He’d spun, one hand raised to strike, a curse on his lips, and stopped abruptly when Sherlock had whimpered. That had brought him up short, the idea that he’d really frightened the bravest (or stupidest) man he’d ever known. But then he’d seen Sherlock’s face. He honestly hadn’t known a self-confessed asexual could ever be that turned on. So that was how John discovered the real reason for Sherlock’s habit of tearing off after gang-land enforcers without back-up, and, he suspected, the reason for his youthful drug habit.

Of course sometimes the things you learn from observing people’s fetishes are things you’d rather not know. He keeps an even closer eye on Sherlock now, as he’s realised just how little grasp on morality and social norms his friend has. He realised that one when he saw Sherlock looking at Mycroft in a distinctly un-brotherly fashion. It makes sense he supposes, Sherlock likes power and danger in others, and they don’t come much more dangerous than Mycroft. And of course it makes his sex life infinitely more interesting. But it doesn’t make it any less worrying.

Their arrangement must look complicated from the outside, he sometimes thinks. After all, it’s almost incomprehensible to him, and he’s in it. The centre of it in fact, if that’s not too pretentious for words. He suspects it is, but also knows it to be true.

He and Mycroft have a sexual relationship. In fact they have a very sexual relationship. They also respect one another and like some of the same restaurants. But that it where there relationship ends. John discovered very early on that the reason Mycroft is so much better than his brother at faking normal emotions is that he so rarely feels anything, which leaves him with plenty of spare brain power for pretending.

Sherlock on the other hand does have emotions, very strong ones, if not exactly normal. He doesn’t however have any real interest in sex. At least not in having sex. He and John have an emotional relationship which is far more fulfilling than anything John has ever experienced. The day he discovered the brothers were amenable to combining the two was one of the best, albeit more worrying, days of his life.

He and Mycroft have enthusiastic, athletic and increasingly kinky sex, often involving ice cream. Sherlock watches. John likes this a little more than he should, especially considering the fact that so does Sherlock. Mycroft was persuaded by the fact that having sex with his brother watching is taboo enough that his whole career could rest, theoretically at least, on keeping the secret. He loves keeping secrets.

Slowly, over time, the relationship became closer. Mycroft would stay longer, talk more freely, show a little genuine affection. Sherlock stopped resenting his brothers presence in John’s life, came to accept him simply as a fact of their relationship. Mycroft would sometimes spend the night, Sherlock would sometimes join them in bed (though of course things remained strictly legal between the brothers, if not morally acceptable).

It was all wonderful, it really was, until the day of the bomb scare.

They never did find out who made the call (though of course both Holmes brothers claimed it was their enemies trying to discredit them – John’s money however was on the next door neighbours, getting some well-earned revenge for all the noisy sex). Of course anyone who examined their weekly shopping could tell you that Sherlock made explosives in his spare time but Grocers rarely go over the past sales at three in the morning so the origin of the call was still unknown.

Normally a specialist bomb squad would have been called, who he probably wouldn’t know and therefore wouldn’t be so embarrassed about appearing half dressed with a selection of Holmes brothers in various states of undress in front of (though still a bit embarrassed because he was English to the core), but any and all cases relating to Sherlock were automatically sent straight to Lestrade. He’d called Sherlock and asked if the bomb was Sherlock’s. Sherlock had sounded slightly annoyed at having to admit it wasn’t and had thrown something of a hissy fit when the Inspector, with his team and a bomb expert in tow, had arrived unannounced and turfed them out onto the pavement without time to find suitable clothes. John was pretty thankful he’d been allowed to find any clothes, even if he was freezing. Mycroft, of course, had John’s lovely warm dressing gown on, and Sherlock had remained fully dressed.  
Anderson sidled up. John didn’t know why he was here, except that perhaps he hoped he might get to examine the blood splatter left when Sherlock was killed by a terrorist bomb.

“Who’s the guy in the dressing gown?” he asked, forgoing the usual social niceties that would preface a question that clearly actually meant, ‘are you shagging him’.

“Sherlock’s older brother, Mycroft.”

“Not much of a looker.”

John felt himself bristle slightly, which was probably what Anderson had intended. Not that he minded Mycroft’s looks being criticised, the man wasn’t much of a looker and perfectly capable of defending himself in any case. What he minded was the implied criticism of his taste.

“He has his moments, but Sherlock got the looks of the family, it’s true. You should hear his voice though, liquid sex.”

John grinned when Anderson shifted slightly, embarrassed but unwilling to back down and admit defeat. He’d never been keen of Anderson, the man was a weasel, and since he’d known Sherlock he’d discovered a hitherto unfound delight in embarrassing people and saying socially awkward things.

“We all thought you were with Sherlock,” Anderson admitted, and John could hear how it pained him to admit fault like that.

“I am.”

“But what about…”

“Oh your assumptions on that score were quite right as well,” John replied, finding he was minding standing on the pavement in the cold and dark less now it involved wrong-footing Anderson.

“What both?! But they’re brothers… that’s…”

“Only illegal if they have sex with one another, which they don’t. Mycroft has a basic understanding of right and wrong, or at least acceptable and unacceptable, and Sherlock isn’t interested in the physical side of relationships.”

“But still… even if they don’t actually have sex…”

John sighed internally. Alright was still shocked on a daily basis by the arrangement, but it would be nice if Anderson could at least try to keep the disgust of his face until John wasn’t actually looking at him.

“But how does that work?” Anderson wailed, looking thoroughly confused.

Sherlock bounced over, his long toes curling and uncurling against the pavement inside their worn socks. “Lestrade says we can go back in now. No bomb. I could have told him that. So what say we celebrate by Mycroft fucking you till you can barely walk while I watch?”

Mycroft appeared behind his left shoulder. The man moved as silently as a ghost, but John had learnt not to flinch when the man’s body heat appeared apparently from nowhere behind him. He’d only reacted violently once. That had been interesting. Very interesting. Mycroft was surprisingly strong for a man who worked in an office all day.

“Much as it pains me to admit it,” he drawled, and his voice was as John had told Anderson, pure sex, “my brother has an excellent plan there.”  
As the Holmes brothers took one of his arms each and prepared to steer him towards their bed he grinned at Anderson.

“This is how it works,” he told him.


End file.
